


and in so doing, it became

by notcaycepollard



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Introspection, POV Second Person, Post 3x07, implied Lincoln/Daisy, mentioned Coulson/Rosalind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-12
Updated: 2015-11-12
Packaged: 2018-05-01 06:53:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5196416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notcaycepollard/pseuds/notcaycepollard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is Daisy learning detachment, you think, and it stings a little that she's warning you not to get your heart broken.</p><p> </p><p>post 3x07. Title from the Books: twelve fold chain</p>
            </blockquote>





	and in so doing, it became

"Buy you a drink?" Rosalind asks, and you say,  _yes_.

You know she's got her own agenda. You're not that naive. But you and she have been playing this game long enough, and you're lonely, you're so  _lonely_ , and when she tied your tie, straightened your collar, you felt what was there.

 _It hurts every day_.

One drink turns into two, and you don't talk. You just lean in, cup her cheek, kiss her matter-of-factly. Or maybe she kisses you, you don't know. Her mouth is warm against yours, tastes like the whisky you're both drinking, and this is so  _easy_.

 _Not having trouble working her, are you?_ Daisy asks in your head, and you close your eyes. You've never been able to shut Daisy out. Never wanted to, even when you've needed to. Now you want to.  _I've learned detachment_ , you think, and that's the problem. You haven't been close to anyone since you died. Your whole life is detached, sealed off, and just for one night, you want this. You want companionship.

You need someone else's hands tying your tie, someone else's hands on your skin. Someone else looking at you without the shared history of your death, her death, all your combined tragedies heavy between you. Rosalind thinks she knows you. She's wrong. You don't think you know Rosalind, but that's okay too.

This is what you need.

 

 

When you get back to base, alone and with the memory of Rosalind's kiss still on your lips, Daisy looks at you with an expression you don't recognize. She wears her heart on her face, but you don't know how to read it.

"So what was it?" she asks. "Blue plate special or raspberry pancakes? I hope you went for the pancakes, Ruthie's pancakes are outstanding." You stare at her for a moment.

"You put a tracker on me?" you demand, and Daisy's eyes slide sideways.

"Not on you," she says, and you feel a flare of anger as you remember how Daisy pulled Rosalind to her feet.

"You had  _no right_ ," you say, heated, and Daisy looks up again, clenches her jaw and then takes a breath, her shoulders rising and falling.

"I had every right," she says, and it's not combative the way you're expecting. It's  _quiet_ , stating a fact and no more, and you've been steeling yourself for an argument.

You could have coped with her anger. You expect her to throw Lincoln back in your face, as if you need a reminder of him, as if you need a reminder of the tracker you ordered Mack to plant. She doesn't say it, just looks away for a moment, stares into the middle distance, takes another deep breath.

"If you think it's inappropriate, then tell her," she says, still quiet. "Tell her it was an unsanctioned move on my part. It's up to you."

"Daisy-" you say, off-balance with this. "You know I didn't want-"

"I'm sorry," she murmurs, cutting you off, and that's surprising. "I was worried when you were away all night without word. I wouldn't have- I wouldn't have activated it otherwise."

"Oh," you say, lamely, and that's right, you were out all night. It was a bad call. You're the Director of SHIELD. It's your _job_ to be here for your people.

"It's none of my business what you do," she tells you. "You have a right to a personal life. If it makes you happy, then-" She pauses, runs her hand through her hair. "Just, be careful. Protect yourself, okay?"

You could have handled her anger, but this, this quiet resignation and distance and careful, composed control, this is alien. This is Daisy learning detachment, you think, and it stings a little that she's warning _you_ not to get your heart broken.

 

 

You don't like Lincoln joining the team. It's petty, and jealous, and you have no call to be jealous, not when you and Rosalind are - you and Rosalind  _are_ , although it hasn't happened again- but you feel it regardless, curling in the pit of your stomach. You hide it with professionalism. It's easy enough.

(You can tell it's not hidden at all, and you hope it just comes across as dislike, distrust, something more easily explained.) _  
_

You hear Daisy speaking loudly, anger in her voice, as they come off the Quinjet, and you wait, arms crossed, until they've paused in the hangar. Joey walks by you, acknowledges you briefly. He's proud, to be a member of Daisy's team, and she's excited with his progress, with what they can do together. This, at least, is something you and Daisy still talk about.

"That's the third time," Daisy says, "the  _third time_ , Lincoln, and it's the last, okay, if you want to stay an active team member in the field. I am the director of these missions, and I need to trust that you will  _obey my orders_." She looks up, sees you in the corner, and presses her lips together. "Director," she says, flatly, and nothing else.

"Everything okay?" you ask, looking between them both. Lincoln's expression is sliding from abashed to impassive now that you're there, and Daisy's face gives away nothing at all.

"Yes," she says, "sir. Thank you." There's another long silence, and you realize she's waiting to continue whatever this is, until you're not around.

"You need-" you ask, and Daisy squares her shoulders a little more.

"No," she says, and in this moment, you see she's a leader apart from you, a leader with her own authority, and that this chastisement is not for you to witness. It shocks you, briefly, stops you in your tracks, but Daisy's waiting for you to leave.

 

 

The base is quiet even during the day, and your office is quietest of all. You think of Daisy playing your records, working on her tablet, investigating the alien carvings. Touching your collectibles and asking you about each item. She touched them like they were precious. They're just _stuff_. A collection of things that might matter to you, or at least, to the you that compiled them so carefully. 

When you walk into the hallway, Daisy and Lincoln are standing at the hangar door, and Lincoln has Daisy's duffel bag slung over one shoulder. "Are you leaving?" you ask, and your voice is uneven and loud in your own head. Daisy turns, and the curve of her cheek is heartbreaking.

"No," she says, "no, we're just going to the Cocoon for a few days."

"Oh," you say, "oh," and it's a relief. You realize, all in a rush, that this is what you've been bracing for since Lincoln stayed, that Daisy would  _leave_ , would walk away with him without a second glance,and SHIELD would fall without her.

"Coulson," Daisy says, very quiet. Her shoulders are square and her face is open, easy. "You know I would never leave SHIELD. My people need me." She turns away, opens the door, doesn't look back.

 _I need you_ , you think, but you've always needed Daisy Johnson.

 

 

"Where's Lincoln?" you ask, when Daisy returns alone, and she bites her lip.

"He's staying at the Cocoon," she says, touches her own wrist. "He- made it clear that he'd rather work with Inhumans during transition, than in the field."

"Made it clear," you say, your tone questioning, and Daisy shifts her weight.

"Yeah," she agrees, and you can feel the lie underneath it, the hidden truth. She bites her lip again, and you see that she's drawn blood sometime recently. Her lower lip is reddened, painful under the catch of her teeth, and this isn't something you know how to help with.

Later, you hear Daisy crying in her bunk, and you want to press your palm to her cheek, wipe away her tears the way you've done before, but this noise, the hitch of her breath, is  _personal_ , and Daisy doesn't need you.

 

 

You don't tell Rosalind about the tracker. Daisy never mentions it again, but she doesn't mention much, least of all Rosalind. When she works joint missions with the ATCU, her face is more expressionless than you've ever achieved.

"Agent Johnson doesn't like me very much," Rosalind says ruefully, and you don't answer, because there's nothing you can say. She's right, of course, but Daisy doesn't have to  _like_ her.

You don't like her very much, sometimes.  _Thatcher_. And the careful compilation of things that will matter to you. And the face she makes when she talks about Daisy's powers, and the way she looks at you sometimes, when she doesn't know you're looking. It's more evaluative than you'd prefer. She's waiting on something, and you're waiting for the ball to drop.

What she's waiting for, it turns out, is Gideon Malick laying out his careful, methodical trap, and you falling straight into it.

Rosalind's long gone. She was gone before she was gone. You think about the tracker, wonder if Daisy will find her. Your shoulders ache. You've been tied to this chair for a long time.

 

 

You feel Daisy coming before you hear her. Vibrations in the concrete of the floor, travelling up into the chair, and you wonder if this is what she feels all the time. She slams the door open, an avenger blazing with her own determined anger.

"You're stupid," she tells you, "I told you to protect yourself," but her voice isn't angry, just full of fond exasperation.

She's right. You're stupid. But you  _needed_ , and you found it where you could, where it was being offered, and your heart was already being broken every day by the tilt of Daisy's chin, the curve of her cheek and the fall of her hair and the slow blink of her lashes. The rise and fall of her shoulders, and her careful distance, and the way she's never needed you, not in the way that counts. These are all the things that matter to you, the things Rosalind never knew to look for.

She blinks, and you think, you're saying this out loud. You're saying all of this. Your vision distorts, and you wonder what it is Rosalind put in that scotch. 

It doesn't matter. The words are out, and you keep saying them,  _I need you, I need you_ , until Daisy's fingertips are soft on your mouth.

"Shh," she says, "Phil, shh."

Maybe you're dying. You've died before. Is that what this felt like?

"You're not dying," Daisy says, and now her voice is amused. "Stop being so melodramatic." You assess the situation. She's probably right. "Come on," she says, "let's get you out of here." She unties you, gathers you up, and you feel faintly ridiculous, but Daisy is warm and there are worse places to be than in her arms.

"How'd you find me?" you ask, your voice slurring, and Daisy looks down at you.

"I lied," she tells you, and you can't feel the tracker under your skin, but you know it's there, along with every expression Daisy Johnson has ever made. She's under your skin, and it should hurt, the way you need her should hurt, but when she presses her fingers to your lips again, it just feels like your whole life, opening up.


End file.
